


i'll love you for a thousand more

by hanzios



Series: mackson missing scenes [4]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Drabble, Fluff, I Love You, M/M, bc i love them, this is just a short fluffy piece
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-18
Updated: 2020-10-18
Packaged: 2021-03-08 19:00:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 560
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27081589
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hanzios/pseuds/hanzios
Summary: Nate says "I love you."And Jackson is just staring at him, dumbfounded.
Relationships: Eric Jackson/Nathan Miller
Series: mackson missing scenes [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2026889
Comments: 4
Kudos: 16





	i'll love you for a thousand more

**Author's Note:**

> this is just a short drabble i wrote one night about that scene where nate goes "you're a healer, not a fighter. that's why i love you." idk, i just love that scene so much. enjoy!

_how can i love when i'm afraid to fall_   
_but watching you stand alone_   
_all of my doubt, suddenly goes away somehow_

**_-a thousand years by christina perri_ **

“You’re a healer, not a fighter. _That’s why I love you._ ”

Nate says it so casually that Jackson doesn’t know how to respond. The warrior just throws out the words, as if it were easy, as if he’d been wanting to say it for a long time, as if he hasn’t been surer of anything in his life.

And Jackson is just staring at him, dumbfounded.

Deep in the crevices of his brain, as he’s searching through years of memories, he’s reminded that nobody has told him those three words since his mother.

His dying mother, as she takes in her last breath, pale hands attempting to hold on to her unfairly young son – _too_ young – as he strokes her cheek and begs her not to die. It has been years and years, yet the memory is still fresh in his brain, because Jackson knows that ever since then, nobody had ever loved him.

Not in a way that mattered, really.

There’s Abby, who’s his mentor, his closest friend, and someone he considers family, but she doesn’t love him the way he loves her. She has other people to pour that love into, and he couldn’t blame her. He wouldn’t.

He’s had boyfriends (two, to be exact), who’d held him and kissed him. But they didn’t love him.

There is a profound loneliness that Jackson carries close to his chest since his mother had died. Although he tries to mask it by giving more of himself to others, the melancholy still lingers on.

But then there’s this boy.

This boy with stark brown eyes and a handsome smirk and a touch that’s soft despite his calloused fists.

He’s in front of him, and _Christ,_ they haven’t even been together for fifty days, but he’s holding Jackson in his hands, and he’s looking deep into his soul and telling him that _he loves him._

He means it.

And Jackson is just staring at him, dumbfounded.

His mouth runs dry and he remembers his mother and he remembers his love for her. And he realizes that that’s how much he loves Nate.

But he can’t say it. Not yet. ~~He’s afraid to say it back.~~

So, Jackson leans forward and kisses him, a hand on Nate’s head, pulling him closer, hoping the other man can feel the way he loves him, in a way that made all those years of loneliness worth it, if only for this one moment.

+

He says it back, three days later.

They’re laying in a bunk bed, bodies pressed together, trying their best to be smaller in a world that had shrunk itself forty-nine days ago.

Jackson’s arms are wrapped tight against Nate’s, their joined hands above his beating chest.

It’s warm.

They’re alive.

Everything else is awful.

But somehow, it’s perfect.

He presses his mouth to the back of Nate’s neck, listening to the soft noise that escapes his lover’s mouth.

“ _I love you,_ ” he says.

Nate holds his hands tighter.

It’s perfect.

He jokes, “Took you long enough.”

Jackson smiles against his skin.

They’re laughing quietly.

He loves Nate.

Nate loves him back the same amount.

Nate loves him back in a way that matters.

It’s perfect.


End file.
